Telstra apologises for billing identity fraud victims

Since 9NEWS revealed the story of Andrew Dwight and his battle with Telstra over 10 mobile phones that were added to his account without his knowledge, more claims of identity theft at the Telco have surfaced.

Graeme Robinson is a pensioner from the Sydney suburb of Colyton. His mobile phone bill is usually well under $200, so when he received one for more than $1,100 he went to Telstra and the police straight away.

Graeme Robinson said Telstra was 'unhelpful' in the way they handled his account. (9NEWS) ()

Over the next few months, the bill increased even further to $2,702 as more new iPhones were added to the account without his knowledge.

"I thought, well I didn't order a smart phone, I don't even know what a smart phone is," he told 9NEWS.

"You would think they would at least want more information when a person rings up, especially when they order six phones, you know brand new phones. So as far as I am concerned they are pathetic."

He said Telstra has been unhelpful. He's been dealing with call centre staff based overseas who don't even understand what state he lives in and keep asking him for more forms of identification.

The bill is even worse for Melbourne pensioner Khalil Eid. He's not even a Telstra customer, so when he received a bill for $181 he went to the company straight away. He said he filed a police report and was told Telstra would handle it.

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Instead a few weeks later he received a bill for more than $24,500, and the demands keep coming.

He said he is waking up in the night worried about it. "I’m worried about how to get the money to pay for something, $25,000 and I'm a pensioner and old man...their customer service is hopeless," he said.

His daughter Fatma, has had to step in from her home in Sydney's south-west, complaining to the ombudsman and dealing with Telstra's complaints department.

After months of getting nowhere, she contacted 9NEWS with a message for the telco: "pull your fingers out. Get it fixed. If you're going to give someone a phone, make sure you get the ID first and make sure you verify it before you issue not one, but two phones."

Khalil Eid isn't even a Telstra customer and got slapped with a bill for more than $24,000. (9NEWS) ()

When 9NEWS contacted Telstra today, it took a few hours for the company to begin to rectify Mr Robinson and Mr Eid's accounts, but they're angry it took media intervention for that to happen.

"We did identify that we could do better for our customers and in response to that have set up our fraud customer care team to help customers have these matters resolved in a much faster and an improved way," Telstra's head of customer service, Fiona Hayes, said.